Dragons And Dung-Beetles
by Kelly1
Summary: The night after "HeX Factor," Pietro ponders his existence and he needs someone to help him through it. Pietrance/Lietro friendship fic. Mild hints of slash.


OMG, I LOVED "The HeX Factor." *Squeals* Little Pietro was so damn adorable!! Wanda is freaking awesome! Take that X-geeks!! And P was soooo sweet when he was trying to talk to her in the bathroom. Awww . . .he needs some serious glomping after that. So I created his pathetic little ficcy for that sole purpose, as well as entertain you with some pointless Pietrance to boot! ^_^ Enjoy. It's sort of a friendship-ish thing, not really slash.  
  
Dung-Beetles And Dragons  
Kelly  
li_luva_2000@yahoo.ca  
  
It was a dragon. A dragon eating a cat . . . or . . . maybe . . . um . . . Evan. Yeah, Evan falling face first into his birthday cake at his sixth grade party. He laughed a little to himself, maybe Daniels wasn't all that bad after all. His birthday cake had lemon filling that year. Pietro hated lemon. His foster parents hadn't cared.   
  
Pietro lay on top of his sheets, staring at the dark stain on his bedroom ceiling, trying to sleep. It was a pointless entertaining little game he often played before night took him away into the happy world of REM where he didn't have worry about the general shittiness of everyday life. But there would be no sleep tonight; not with her in the same house.   
  
Why did Mystique bring his sister here? He wasn't ready for her, wasn't ready at all . . . Wasn't ready for his father, wasn't ready to face his past . . . it wasn't as if Magneto had been much better to him, abandoning him when he was eleven in the orphanage. Pietro sat up and peered over the edge of his bed. On the floor, Lance moaned quietly in his sleep. Wanda was staying in Rocky's room and the couch still had a coat rack jammed through it, so everyone had kind of been displaced. Pietro didn't want to be alone tonight anyway. Lance started to snore. He snickered again - not that Avalanche was the most scintillating company.   
  
He needed someone to talk to. "Lance," he whispered, "Are you sleeping?"  
  
He groaned and rolled over, lifting his head ever so slightly off of his pillow. Pietro watched the older boy stretch, defined muscles glistening in the white moon light that streamed through his bedroom window. "Apparently not," Lance replied with chagrin. His expression softened, "What's wrong Speedy?" Concern creased his face as he stood up from the half inflated air-mattress.  
  
"Life's a bitch."  
  
"Is that all?" He placed his arm around Pietro's shoulder and sat beside him on the bed. Pietro cocked his eyebrow. "You were supposed to laugh, Quickie."  
  
"I don't find my misery all that funny."  
  
Lance sighed. "Fine," he resigned, "You're right, I'm sorry." He stroked Pietro's hair with surprising gentleness, "Tell me all about it." Pietro felt like a little kid, but Lance was showing him compassion he had never known in his youth.  
  
"Do you think I'm like Magneto?"  
  
"Now there's a loaded question if I've ever heard one."  
  
"Seriously, Lance, don't joke. Do you think I'm like my father?"  
  
Lance's faced shifted in thoughtfulness. He paused, "Yeah, I guess. It depends what you mean. You look like him and all."  
  
"No, not physically. Inside." He shifted his gaze to the floor, "Wanda . . . she called him a monster today and . . . and she said I was just like him."  
  
"P, you're not a monster. Would I be best friends with a monster?"  
  
"Maybe."  
  
He laughed incredulously. "Speedy, you're funny, and you're cute, and you're smart, and you're one of the nicest people I know. Shit, how can you not see that? You're nothing like Magneto, nothing - you understand me, kid? You're way better than that."  
  
"Why couldn't he just be an ordinary father? I want him to be here Lance. I want him to tell me he loves me and that he's proud of me and that he doesn't give a fuck whether or not I'm a mutant, that he's just happy I'm his son. I don't want to fight anymore. Not against him . . . not for him. Not at all. NOT FUCKING AT ALL!"  
  
"Shh, it's okay. It's going to be alright." Lance held him tighter, Pietro buried his face in the strong shoulder.  
  
"No it's not Lance, don't you see? Mystique asked me today where my loyalties lie and . . . I just don't know anymore. I want to stay here with you and Todd and Fred and just be normal. Just hang out and mess around and have fun with our powers. Fuck, I mean, you have a girlfriend who I'm sure is perfectly nice, but we don't get to hang out with her. You don't go to her house, she doesn't come here. And it's all because of this stupid shit we've gotten ourselves stuck in."  
  
"It's not just that, it's . . ." Lance trailed off, "I dunno."  
  
"It's exactly that, Lance. There's no fucking difference between us and the x-men except the psychotic freak that recruited us. We're fighting a battle that's not even ours, all of us. Do we follow Mystique and be soulless mercenaries? Or my father, and claim supremacy over the human race? Or Xavier, and let ourselves be killed by the bigoted masses looking to lynch mutants at the first chance?"  
  
"P . . . You're right, you know. We're fucking screwed," he laughed, "Life's a bitch."  
  
"And that doesn't bother you?"  
  
"Intensely."  
  
"How can you be so calm about it?"  
  
"Life . . . happens Pietro. It doesn't matter what we want or what we wish would take place. It's there, we're in it. We live, we die, and only one in about ten million of us get remembered. In two hundred years, nobody's going to give a flying dick whether or not I tried to join the x-men, or if I stayed with you guys, or if I hung my freaking boxers up on the school flagpole and ran around nude for three weeks. It doesn't matter Pietro. In the grand scheme of things, we're about as important as a dung-beetle."  
  
"Oh, that's reassuring," he replied sarcastically.   
  
"It should be, Speedy. Just do what makes you happy. If you don't want to fight, don't. It's your decision. Me personally, I kind of like your plan of us brotherhood guys hanging out, of being normal."  
  
"We're not normal Lance."   
  
Lance lay back on the bed, his hands behind his head, pulling Pietro down beside him, "But we can pretend to be." Pietro smiled, listening to the comfortable silence between the two boys. In his own strange way, Lance was right. Pietro couldn't dwell on what might be. He had to live for now. "Damn I never noticed that spot on your ceiling before, P. Do you know what it looks like?"  
  
"What?"  
  
"A dragon eating a cat."  
  
The End  
  
Ahh, craptacularness abounds. Oh well, I sorry for wasting a good ten minutes of your life. Please forgive me ^_^ Have a great day! By the way, 'cause I like to hear what you guys think, what was your favorite part of "The HeX Factor"? 


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